3 takeaways from the Yankees' opening series vs. the San Francisco Giants
The Yankees' Aaron Judge, right, is congratulated by Cody Bellinger after hitting a home run against the San Francisco Giants during the fifth inning of a game in San Francisco on Saturday. Credit: AP/Jeff Chiu
SEATTLE — The Yankees completed a three-game sweep of the Giants to open the season, giving them a third consecutive year with a 3-0 start. Because of the oddity of being a part of Wednesday night’s standalone MLB opener, the Yankees had a rare Sunday off before starting a three-game series against the Mariners on Monday night. Then they’ll return to New York for Friday’s home opener.
Here are three takeaways from the Yankees’ first series in San Francisco:
1. The lineup has been as advertised when it comes to depth
It has been a criticism over the years — and a fair one — that the Yankees have been overly reliant on the home run. Much of the verbiage coming from spring training was that that won’t be the case this season, and it wasn’t in San Francisco.
The Yankees won Wednesday’s opener, 7-0, without the benefit of the long ball as eight of the nine positions in the batting order collected at least one hit. Hitters 7-9 were especially productive, collecting four of those hits.
Home runs by Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton accounted for all of the scoring in the Yankees’ 3-0 victory in the second game, and Judge went deep again Saturday in a 3-1 win. But the feast-or-famine element that was so much a part of past Yankees offenses was noticeable in its absence.
2. If you were worried about the bullpen, this was the series for you
Everything at this time of the year — meaning the season’s first month, and even the second — is subject to overreaction. But for a unit that came into the year as the club’s biggest question mark, the first three games could not have gone better.
Relievers threw a combined 2 2⁄3 scoreless innings Wednesday and followed that effort with 3 2⁄3 scoreless innings Friday and 4 2⁄3 more on Saturday.
In total, 11 innings without allowing a run.
David Bednar, a trade-deadline acquisition last season and considered one of the few givens in the bullpen, went 2-for-2 in saves.
Most encouraging were the performances of the two other arrivals at last year’s deadline, Camilo Doval and Jake Bird. Neither was very good after joining the Yankees, but both carried their strong spring training performances into the regular season.
Doval looked like his 2023 All-Star self in particular in the eighth inning Friday when he struck out the side. Bird’s sinker, flat a season ago, has been on point in his two outings. He was especially effective Saturday when he escaped a runners-at-the-corners, none-out jam to keep it a 3-1 lead.
3. Judge’s O-fer in Game 1 didn’t bring the curtain down on his season
Somehow, it really didn’t. Judge’s 0-for-5, four-strikeout performance in the opener prompted some of the silliest discourse, both via the written and spoken word, in some time.
Judge, a three-time AL MVP who you may have heard has yet to win a title, went hitless in his first two at-bats of the second game on Friday, engendering even more nonsense. Then he quieted the roar, at least momentarily, with a home run in his eighth at-bat of the season.
Judge, not close to being locked in at the plate, nonetheless homered again on Saturday.
If one player should have earned the benefit of the doubt when it comes to not overreacting to early results — he was hitting .197 as of May 2 in 2024 before nearly winning the Triple Crown and coasting to his second MVP — it seemingly would be Judge.
Common sense dictates that every game, let alone every at-bat, simply cannot be a referendum on any player during the 162-game schedule. But it sure seems as if that point has been reached with Judge.
Erik Boland started in Newsday's sports department in 2002. He covered high school and college sports, then shifted to the Jets beat. He has covered the Yankees since 2009.
More Yankees headlines
